


And I'll find you love me too

by impossibletruths



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/F, Gardens & Gardening, Kisses, secret garden
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-05
Updated: 2016-08-05
Packaged: 2018-07-29 15:06:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7689214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/impossibletruths/pseuds/impossibletruths
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Springtime is a searching time, but she who searches may well up finding something, and Keyleth has found more than just a garden today.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And I'll find you love me too

**Author's Note:**

> Title from “Come to My Garden” from the musical The Secret Garden, which I love a lot

She runs into her entirely by accident. Cassandra mentioned something about a secret garden somewhere on the estate grounds, and Keyleth being, well, Keyleth, had thought today as good a day as any to investigate. The advent of spring brings freshwater melt down from the mountains, and the land teems with new life, the seeds she imbued with druidic magics during her many hours spent healing the Sun Tree finally bursting forth, turning snow and dirt to a thick carpet of green.

 _Springtime is a searching time_ , her mother used to say, _when the plants search for the sun and the animals search for each other and little druid girls search for flowers_. 

Today, it is a time for Keyleth to search for a secret garden.

Cassandra says she will know it by the ancient maple, and Keyleth knows she could cheat, could ask the plants of the garden where the old tree is, but the fun is in the exploration, so instead she wanders the overgrown paths, half-tended and beginning to burst forth in spring growth. Her fingers itch to dig into the dirt, to trim back wild hedges and coax hidden bulbs to grow into the weak sunlight of late winter, but she has a task set before her, one that she will complete before she comes back to tend the grounds.

But, when they are finished with their travels and trials––if they ever finish––Keyleth hopes to come back here, and turn this tangle of brambles and weeds into a garden once more.

So occupied with these thoughts, she notices neither the gnome nor the door until she is nearly upon them, and stops short in surprise, warmth blooming within her to see––

“Pike?”

Pike jumps, ivy swinging back across the wall that is not wholly a wall, and Keyleth catches a glimpse of a faded red door behind it.

“Keyleth! What are you doing here?”

“Cassandra said there was a secret garden.” She considers Pike, and the faded door, and the barren branches of a towering tree on the other side of the wall, and puts the pieces together. “Though, it looks like maybe you found it.”

Pike laughs, a warm sound tinged with sadness. “I’ve had a little more time to look.”

Yes, that’s true, though Keyleth wishes it weren’t. Their cleric has spent more time at Whitestone than any of them save Percy, and Keyleth misses her presence with them out in the wilds. They are all a little less certain without the cleric, a little less safe, but there’s a selfish desire there too, a bone-deep ache that settles in her as soon as they leave Pike, and eases as soon as they return, and Keyleth tries not to think too hard about it, because she knows Pike loves someone already.

“Will you show me?” asks Keyleth, and Pike stills. “Only if you want,” the druid backtracks hurriedly. Pike has been more reserved since they returned, and if she has found solace in this place then Keyleth does not want to disturb it; she understands the need to seek solitude.

“No, I’d like to,” Pike assures her. “I’ve been, um, trying to help it along, a little. I’m not druid, but...” She smiles, and shrugs a little, and Keyleth thinks of the garden she keeps––kept––within the chapel at Greyskull, and warm joy blooms within her.

“Healers and gardeners aren’t so different,” Keyleth assures her. “You’re very good at both.”

Pink dusts Pike’s cheeks, and the gnome seems to brighten as she turns back to the door, producing a key and finding the lock. A moment later the old door creaks open, and Pike holds the climbing ivy aside so Keyleth might duck into the garden.

Walls rise on all four sides. An overgrown path of white stone runs parallel to them, and then branches off to form a simple cross, meeting in the center around the base of a towering, bare-branched maple tree. Rosebushes line the ivy-covered wall, overgrown and grey, spilling across the path, which itself is riddled with weeds, as are the flowerbeds full of dead-looking shrubs and stems that line the walkway. The only green in the garden is the untrimmed grass. It is a garden gone grey and colorless in winter’s sleep.

But there is life too. At the far side of the garden, opposite the door, Keyleth spies a budding rosebush ringing a small stone bench, and the path there lies clear of weeds and brush, and Keyleth sees clearly Pike’s gentle, firm hand.

“It’s not much,” says Pike behind her, door swinging shut. “I only found it last week, and you’ve all been back, and I’ve been a bit busy.”

“It’s wonderful,” Keyleth tells her, staring up at the bare branches of the enormous maple. She breathes deep, and can _feel_  the life in this place, on the cusp of springing forth, heady and sweet. “Pike, it’s absolutely wonderful.”

“Oh, I’m glad,” says the cleric with a little laugh, uncommonly bashful, and Keyleth looks down to see the gnome blushing again. “It was supposed to be a surprise, but I didn’t know when you’d be back.”

“A surprise?” asks Keyleth. “For us?”

“For you,” says Pike, and now Keyleth feels like the garden––full of life and fresh growth, bright and new.

“Really?” she gasps, taking it all in with new eyes, a dozen and one ideas slipping out of her mind as Pike’s words sink in. For her.

“I though, since everyone else has places here, you might like one too. And, I thought you might like something to do besides wait.”

She says it with a sad smile, a smile that knows the pain of waiting, and Keyleth kneels to look at her, eye-to-eye.

“I’m sorry we left without you,” says Keyleth, and Pike’s face falls further. “But I’m really glad we came back. I missed you.”

“Me too,” says Pike. Keyleth smiles.

“So will you help me?”

“What?”

“With the garden. You started it, after all.”

“Oh, well, I wasn’t sure you’d want me to, y’know, be here.”

Keyleth stares. “Of course I do! You found it, anyways, and you’ve worked so hard too. And, I’d like your company.” She adds the last part quietly, an invitation, and a grin breaks across Pike’s face.

“Then, yes,” she laughs. “Yes, of course, I’d love to.”

Keyleth smiles back, and presses a kiss to Pike’s cheek. Pike freezes, and blushes, and then surges forward and kisses Keyleth back, on the lips, her hands grabbing onto Keyleth’s shirt, her eyes screwed shut, and for a moment Keyleth is shocked to stillness.

Then Pike pulls back, eyes wide, words tripping over each other. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have––”

“Pike!” Keyleth interrupts, her eyes just as wide, her voice raised in surprise, and hope. “Do you like me?”

Pike stares at her, and then laughs. “Yes, Keyleth.”

Keyleth blinks a few times, and then––because, she has wanted to for nearly as long as she has known the cleric––kisses Pike back, quick and cautious, the soft press of lips, and then pulls away again, watching Pike’s reaction.

The gnome blinks a couple of times.

“Keyleth,” she says, far more reserved than the druid, “do you like me?”

“Yes,” Keyleth admits, bashful, and Pike smiles like the sun.

“Oh,” says the cleric. “Well, that’s good then.”

“Yeah,” Keyleth agrees, and they both break out laughing.

“I’m sorry,” says Keyleth. “I’m not very good at this.”

“I like you just the way you are,” says Pike, and Keyleth blushes.

“So, um, will you show me what you’ve been doing?” the druid asks, and Pike laughs, and leads her across the garden, and Keyleth kneels next to her as she points out freshly planted seeds and wick stems and green buds, and if Keyleth maybe lets their fingers brush more than they should, or if Pike leans in closer than she need, neither mentions it.

Springtime is a searching time, but she who searches may well up finding something, and Keyleth has found more than just a garden today.

Her mother, she thinks, would be happy for that.


End file.
